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In the end, Vee didn’t get to the girl she loved so much in time. She tried her best, rushed as much as she could, but it simply wasn’t enough.
Clara Heartfield, her girlfriend, had been affected by her tears on accident, last night, Vee had started to have doubts about her future, she thought that Luz was going to try to kick her out of the family, or that she didn’t even deserved to be on Earth in the first place.
It took Camila and Clara’s intervention to calm her down, they promised to her everything would be fine, that she had nothing to worry about and Vee, still unsure, had cried on their laps for several minutes, neither of the two humans seemed to mind, just caressing her back and her long tail to help dismiss those dark thoughts away.
But the weird thing about basilisk’s tears was that, once you touched them, your body started to transform into a basilisk itself, little by little, Vee knew that, that was the reason why the Emperor’s Coven held her and the other creatures in captivity for so long, they wanted their tears, they wanted to force them to give their powers to the Emperor.
For whatever reason, that plan never worked and once Vee was free, she didn’t think about the matter anymore, but she couldn’t imagine that forgetting about that detail would cause this… disaster.
It started the morning after her breakdown, when Camila’s work colleagues called to tell her something was very wrong with her Mom, Vee transformed into a Speed Devil and rushed to the veterinarian’s office; when she got there, she saw her, half her body looked normal, but the other one…
She was covered in scales, her entire body twitching uncontrollably, the woman let out several screams and Vee wasn’t sure if she was hurt, scared out of her mind, or both; still, she jumped to action, opened her mouth and little by little, absorbed every trace of basilisk magic in Camila’s system, slowly turning her into her regular human form. However, this was basically an exchange of magical energy, which meant that, as Camila turned into a regular person, Vee transformed into her original shape.
She didn’t care about that and once the process was done, Vee nudged her face against her mother’s neck, barely paying attention to the two humans behind her asking questions about what just happened, she stayed there for what seemed like an eternity until she remembered something.
She had cried over Clara too.
And so, without saying another word, she turned into a Speed Devil once more and rushed towards the Heartfield’s home.
But as soon as she got to Clara’s room, she realized it was too late. Still, she jumped towards her now basilisk-looking girlfriend, who was laying on her bed surrounded by her parents, she tried to absorb the magic in her system, to save her from a life of rejection and dismay.
But her effort was useless, for just one second later a soft green light covered Clara’s body and the girl let out a huge roar, startling her parents, her mother shouted a bunch of incoherencies and her father simply stayed there, frozen until both of them fell to the floor, fainted at seeing the image of their dear daughter turned into a demonic creature.
Vee gasped, realizing there was nothing she could do now and then she took a long look at her girlfriend: She was covered in blue and golden scales, her lips were red, not as big as Vee’s own, unlike her fangs, much larger than a basilisk of her age, pink spots were scattered from her belly to the top of her head and she extended one sharp claw towards Vee while she opened her mouth, she was obviously trying to say something to her, but no human sound came out, only an unnatural growl. Vee tried to touch her face, but with a move that was filled with instinct, Clara wrapped her tail around her arms.
Vee couldn’t help herself and blushed at the touch, it felt much warmer and softer than her own tail, it was also filled with golden scales, but unlike Vee’s these ones felt impossibly light, fragile even and Vee moved just a little so she could hold the appendage, staring at the orange fur at the end of it. Clara looked like the most beautiful basilisk she had ever seen and her heart and bile sac moved rapidly on her chest, both of them out of control.
But then, Vee shook her head, this wasn’t the time to think about beautiful basilisks, this was a crisis and she had to act fast! And so, she attempted to reach for her girlfriend, she tried to promise to her that everything would be alright, but Clara growled once more and broke contact with her, Vee spoke again but the other basilisk refused to listen to her and used her newfound form to crash against the window of her room and land on the pavement, slithering away from Vee’s sight.
Before running behind her, Vee transformed into one of her strongest forms and picked up Clara’s parents, softly putting them on the couch, hopefully, she would solve this and the two adults would just think they had a bad dream.
Then, the basilisk turned into a human and walked out of the house, using her nose to trace the magic left by Clara’s body, which was surprisingly easy, although she frowned a little when she felt something else mixed with the magic.
Fear, pain, hate, even. Still, she followed her instincts until she found her girlfriend, hiding behind a trash can on a dark alley, she approached to her, taking little steps, but when she felt she was close, Clara hissed at her.
“Why?” she said, her voice rasp, teary and full of sorrow and pain “Why would you do this to me?”
“What?” Vee muttered.
Clara growled again, human words mixing with basilisk sounds:
“Why would you turn me into a basilisk? I thought you loved me, I thought you accepted me as a human”
“I do Clara, I swear!”
“It doesn’t feel like it” Clara relied, turning away “It feels like you just used me to transform me into this… thing”
Those words felt like a dagger in Vee’s heart, in any other situation, she would run away or even lash out if she heard those words from anyone else, but this was Clara, soft, sweet, perfect Clara and she was suffering. Vee could understand that kind of pain, the one that fills your mind with wrong and dark thoughts, the one who makes you leave everything behind and never go back, Vee felt that many many times.
What she couldn’t accept was letting Clara live a life like that, so she sat on the cold pavement and softly stroke her back, the golden basilisk flinched at the contact, but that was her only movement, so Vee decided to speak:
“I never meant to cause you this, Clara, this was only the effect of my tears, this happened only because I was too scared about the future, because I didn’t feel strong enough”
The basilisk didn’t reply and Vee continued:
“You and mom were there to hold me and calm me down and she got affected too…”
“Is she…?”
“She’s okay. She’s back into human form but I can’t do the same for you, I got to you too late, the process is irreversible now”
“Yeah...” Clara muttered, her claws shaking “I kind of feel what you mean”
“But still…” Vee whispered, moving her hand through Clara’s fur “I want to help you, I can help you, all I ask you is to trust in me”
Clara turned around and Vee smiled at her, but then the golden basilisk frowned and said.
“Why can you turn into a human but I can’t? I’ve been trying for the last ten minutes, but there’s no use”
“You should be able to…” Vee said, extending her hand towards her face “You’re a basilisk, after all”
“Well, I can’t, I just told you I can’t” Clara lashed out at her, her claws piercing the air and smashing against human skin.
Vee fell back, holding her arm and biting her lip, no matter how much this hurt, it was nothing compared to the suffering she was causing to her girlfriend, but still, the wound burned like hell and she moved her arm, seeing how the blood started to come out, slowly but surely.
“I’m sorry…” Clara said with a gasp, slithering towards her, knowing that after such an attack Vee would probably run away.
But instead, the young demon knelt in front of her and kissed her temple.
“Don’t worry about that” she muttered, her voice breaking a little “All I care about is helping you so you don’t have to do the same things I did…”
“What do you mean?”
Vee gently caressed Clara’s tail, watching her shiver before adding:
“Running away, hiding in dark places, getting violent, fearing that people might see you... I went through all of that before and I don’t want you to live the same things”
Clara hissed again, but this time, buried her face in Vee’s neck, who kissed her temple and repeated:
“I’m sorry… I’m so sorry for this…”
Clara wanted to say this wasn’t her fault, but she couldn’t, she tried to reassure her that everything would be alright, but she could feel that her body kept refusing to adopt another form, resisting to any thoughts of taking a different shape. And if that was the case and she remained a basilisk, then nothing would be okay ever again.
Or at least that’s what she thought, until Vee said:
“Do you trust me?”
Clara looked at her, bright huge brown eyes staring into small human orbs and simply nodded.
For all response, Vee turned into a Speed Devil, lifted her up and ran away towards her house…
Everything felt different as a basilisk, Clara decided. The wind, usually strong and harsh, felt like a soft breeze on her hard skin, her frilly ears moved up and down, incredibly sensitive to the sounds of the streets, her eyes were able to watch everything around her, incredibly keeping up with Vee’s velocity.
But something felt the same as always, something hadn’t changed, and that was the sense of warm, security and happiness that came with hearing Vee’s voice, all of those feelings washed over her like a wave of relief when she heard:
“We’re back in your room, your parents are still asleep, so you don’t have to worry about them”
When Clara took a look at her girlfriend, Vee smiled, returning to her basilisk form.
“I don’t even know why you brought me here”
“So you feel comfortable and safe, so you can focus on what you have to do…”
Clara looked at her girlfriend, still holding her claw, she focused on her injured arm and touched it a little, but Vee didn’t even flinch. Clara managed to wrap her tail around her body and put her head under her chin, whispering:
“I feel comfortable and safe when you are here, no matter where we are”
He chuckled a little when she heard Vee sobbing, until she replied:
“Tell your gay basilisk heart to focus, Clara”
The other girl let out a mix of laughter and roars, until Vee grabbed her by the ears, looked into her eyes, opened her mouth and…
“Are you going to kiss me?”
“Clara?”
“Yeah?”
“Focus on your form, on the way you look as a human…”
Clara remained silent and Vee traced a finger through her tail, grabbed her shoulders and insisted:
“Focus on your short, cute, blonde hair, with that perfectly pink line crossing from top to bottom, focus on your sky blue eyes, deep as the ocean and warm like a summer morning, focus on your round ears and the y they get red every tie your flustered, in your soft, little but strong human hands, on that cute little mole you have on the back of your neck, on your little wriggly fingers and those long legs of yours that drive me insane every time you are using your cheerleader outfit… Focus on all of that, okay?”
Before Clara could reply, Vee opened her mouth, she realized what was the problem, Clara was a basilisk and she should be able to transform, but she lacked the key ingredient to do it. So she went back to being a basilisk, opened her mouth again and little by little, poured as much magic in her girlfriend as she could, she closed her eyes and released days and days of transformations, adventures, monsters, praying that all of that would be enough to help her.
“Focus, Clara… Focus”
She was still with her eyes closed and holding her breath when she heard:
“Vee?”
She looked at her girlfriend and smiled when she saw she was human again, not only that, but she was wearing her cheerleader uniform!
“You did it, you did it!” Vee shouted, transforming into a human and scooping Clara in her arms, the blonde girl laughed and leaned over her ear, whispering:
“What was that about my legs driving you insane?”
Vee shrieked at the sound of her voice and let her go, making the cheerleader giggle at her silly attitude, Clara wanted to have a little more fun with her, but in that moment the door of her bedroom opened and her parents came running:
“Clara!” David shouted “Are you…?”
“Okay?” Deborah completed, shocked.
“Of course I’m okay, why wouldn’t I?” her daughter replied.
“Sweetie, you turned into a red… lizard… thing”
“No, no” David corrected her “It was more like a golden dragon”
“It has large arms!”
“Not that large, it did have a large tail”
“It didn’t have a tail, it had wings!”
“Wings, don’t be…”
“Mr. and Mrs. Heartfield” Vee interrupted them and both adults stared at her “I think you’ve been watching too many sci-fi movies lately”
“But… I could have sworn…” David said, then Immediately frowned “I guess you’re right, Vee”
“Maybe we are too exhausted, darling” Deborah accepted.
“In that case, why don’t we go back to bed?”
“Sweetheart, is 5 PM!”
“I won’t take a no for an answer!” David shouted, lifting up his wife and carrying her to their bedroom
“Sorry about the interruption, girls” Deborah shouted before disappearing.
Once they were gone, Clara let out a sigh of relief, but whispered:
“I’ll have to tell them at some point, I can’t keep this secret forever…”
As if her brain decided to betray her, she transformed back into her basilisk form an instant later, Vee did the same and softly touched her tail with her own, muttering:
“Whatever you decide to do, I’ll be here for you”
“That’s good to know…” Clara replied, purring against Vee’s chest, she then slapped her cheek softly with her tail and added “Sorry for my lack of crazy long legs…”
“Oh, drop that already” Vee said with a little frown, before hugging her basilisk friend and whispering into her ear “You look even more beautiful like this”
Clara couldn’t help herself and the scales in her face flared up in an intense blush, which made Vee laugh, she hid her face on her girlfriend’s chest once more and let out a happy sigh.
Life wasn’t going to be easy from now on, but with Vee by her side, she was sure she could overcome any obstacle…